willedoo

Sometimes I think I'd like to be off grid, but with the amount of mains power I use it's still the cheapest option by far. When I got the power on in 1994, it only cost me $5,000. The power company will run the power free of charge a maximum of 30 metres into the property (owner supplies the pole). From there I have 100 metres overhead which was $2,000, and from there about 250 metres of underground cable which was $3,000. With the three phases, that's four 35mm underground cables, so I'd hate to guess what the cost would be these days. If it was all overhead I probably could have got away with single phase, but over that distance it's good to share the load over two phases. It didn't cost much extra for the third phase cable so I got it put in for a couple of reasons. At the time I thought it was good to have in case I ever decided to run any three phase equipment, and even though I'll probably never use it for that purpose, the fourth underground cable is good insurance in case one of the two I use is ever knocked out by lightning or some other reason. Half the underground section runs up the centre of the driveway, so wiring in the unused fourth cable is a cheap fix if I lose a cable. Touch wood it hasn't happened but when the old underground copper phone line was in use, I had to get Telstra out a few times to replace phone cable from lightning strikes. It hits trees and travels down the roots to zap the cable.

Jerry, 95% of Iranians are followers of Islam. They are Persians not Arabs, is the more correct way to describe them.

I'm not sure whether smart meters are available down our road. In theory you would think it would be a much better, more efficient way of doing it. All in all over the years, I've had a fairly good run with meter reads. When Energex did it themselves it worked good. They had Energex employees in Suzuki 4wd vehicles that could access all the rural properties. When Cleanaway took over, they didn't want to tackle rural driveways so they'd leave a card in the letterbox saying they couldn't get access and would estimate it. The only irritating thing about it was the BS they'd put on the card as the reason they couldn't access the property, eg: weather when it was a perfectly sunny day, dog on premises when there is no dog etc.. I was glad when they eventually stopped leaving the cards with the fairy stories. Back when Energex used to read the meters, I had a visit one day from a bloke who had come to investigate if I was stealing power. What it was is that I have 3 phase power but the third phase is not connected to the meter as I don't have any 3 phase equipment and only use the outlets from the other two. Every meter read it would show up as two meters with a reading and one was always still on zero. Once I explained the situation, they were happy and I never heard any more about it again.

Nev, I've been with Origin for quite a few years now and have had a fairly good run with them. I swapped over from AGL back when they lost a lot of customers, mainly due to their billing department. They overcharged me on a bill and I think it took 9 months from the start of the process until they finally paid it. At one stage they got into a lot of trouble in this district and customers left them in doves. They got into trouble over fake local newspaper headlines. If a customer left, they would print a fake copy of the local paper, with the ex customer's name splashed across the headline. The printed story was designed to shame the customer with very disparaging headlines about why they left. Some old ladies received it in the mail and thought it was real and it caused them a lot of stress. I think from memory the head of the billing department was forced to resign over it. I'd already left AGL by then, but I remember their billing department at the time as being very arrogant and difficult in my dealings with them. What a way to do business. It took them a long time to recover any sort of reputation in this district after that. The way it works here, Energex (formerly government owned South East Queensland Electricity Board) is the supplier and you have to buy your power from a retailer of your choice. Origin in my case. The meter reading is all done by Energex sub-contractors and Energex passes the numbers on to the retailer. The Energex sub-contractor for the meter reding is Cleanaway and it's gone way downhill since they took that job over. When Energex did the meter reading themselves, it was faultless.

Beautiful sounding engine. I used to like listening to those hit and miss engines at the pioneer shows. Another favourite was watching the Lanz Bulldogs idling.

onetrack, I must admit part of the attraction to the YB, apart from nostalgia and being a good engine, is a bit of local pride. Back in the day the foundry was one of the biggest businesses in town.

I do understand your comments Nev, and appreciate them. One thing with this project is that it's about the journey, not the destination. In regard to adding to challenges, I do a lot of that on purpose. It's the challenge of projects that attracts me, not so much the end result. Yes, there's easier way of doing things and if I just wanted the end product I'd go out and buy it and save myself a lot of time. But that's not what this project is about. All good advice from you Nev, and starting off with something good would suit some. In this case, I'm neither starting with something good, nor am I resurrecting a pile of junk. It's a scratch build; I'm building a pile of junk from scratch. That's the basic idea of it at ths stage. It will be a good challenge. I've done a lot of restoration work, but always restoring something to original condition. There's a lot more freedom in this project.

My supplier, Origin, are doing the same thing now. Previously when they estimated it, it was based on my own average useage. Recently they changed it to an estimate based on average household use across the board which is about four times what I use. Most of the readings now are estimates, so every three monthly bill I receive a way too high bill, then submit a self read, then they reissue the correct bill. I guess it's the way it will be every three months from now on.

Now that I really think about it, that would have been the battery setup we had. I remember a lot of them so they were probably all 2 volt. We had a YB as well, it was a good old motor.

I can't remember if the battery bank was 4x8 volt or 5x6 volt + 1x2 volt. They were stuffed, just there for show. As soon as the genset died, the lights went out.

Nev, do you mean 32 volt? That's what all the properties ran when I was growing up. Still got the generator in the shed. I just wish I still had the Southern Cross diesel we ran it with.

For the same reason as with solo bikes, I can't ride horses any more unless I had a big platform to walk up an get on it's back. Probably a good idea I don't do it any more.

I think it's whatever floats people's boats. I think golfers are mad, but golfers don't.

It will have a sidecar on it. It's the only way I could ride it after the hip replacement, to mount something solid. You should have seen me trying to get on a mate's Deuce on the weekend, it was comical. Think of it this way Nev, when you look at a lot of those custom jobs, how many ever actually see a highway, or come anywhere near to using a lot of the power they've built into their motors. Most do it partially for a bit of show, but mainly as an engineering exercise combined with the fun of just doing it. It's all about fun.

I don't. That 700 maxim HP is nothing to see here. I mentioned it just as an example of the strength of the motor, which also is a big advantage for those types that want to build rods and race cars. The Iron block LS1 engine blocks will handle another 300HP on that at around 1,000. Again, all theoretical, nohing to do with me.

Another thing with car engines - there's a lot of cheap ones around with the basic motor there, but a lot of bolt-ons not included. That's ok for someone looking to replace a motor in their vehicle where they already have all the accessories. Starting from scratch, I think you're better off paying more for a complete engine, eg: most of what you need to run and use the motor. Otherwise you could get a big shock to the wallet trying to track down all those missing bits. You might pay $1,000 or $1,500 more for a complete unit, but you might save at least twice that over having to buy bits. Another thing I like on the LS1 engine is the use of reuseable O ring type gaskets on things like the rocker covers, intake manifold etc..

A few random thoughts on engines. As mentioned previously, with a plot like this, not much construction happens until an engine is decided on and sorted. About all that can happen until that point is sorting out some parts and more plotting. There's two logical choices, a bike engine or a car engine, and above all, something with a V configuration (that's not Japanese). So that's the basic parameters. None of the engines I have here are suitable. With my own restrictions preventing the use of any old engine, sorting out a motor will be the highest cost component. A Harley engine would be nice, but fairly expensive. You could probably buy a unit Sportster motor for the price of just the bare motor in a big twin, but getting a cheap and practical reverse gear setup on a Sportster engine is problematic. A fairly simple job on the later big twin gearboxes, but a bit of money involved in buying an engine plus gearbox in reasonable condition. Then there's car motors, the main issue being what will fit. You see some rat bikes with huge car engines that require a really high custom fuel tank, or fuel tanks located somewhere other than above the engine, bike style. I'd much prefer to have a more traditional style of bike tank over the motor. That brings up the issue of total height from ground clearance to where it will fit under a fuel tank. That makes it hard for carburettor motors. I think even a short block engine like a 253 would be getting too high with carburettor and air cleaner. Some people custom build tanks that have a big hollow to take that and even have intakes poking out the top of the tank. But I'd really like to use my 5 gallon Fat Bob tank rather than a custom. I've also figured out the Buick 3800 has too much bulk above the rocker boxes to practically fit. One motor I like for a lot of reasons is the GM LS1 engine. For a 5.7 litre engine, it's very compact and only about 500mm wide. They have a cast ali sump pan that's not tall, as well as being strong. On the opposite end, the EFI intake is very low profile and saves a lot of height compared to most other comparable V8s or V6s. They are also light with an ali block and heads, and combined with their efficient water jacket design, you can get away with a smaller radiator than the iron V8s. A pushrod motor, so a cam upgrade is relatively cheap and easy. Wth the lifter guides, no need to remove heads and manifolds to swap cams. A strong motor with a skirted block, 6 bolt mains, and rods and crank in standard form are good to 700HP, so they're very popular with rodders and the like. Roller rockers as standard on a rocker cradle, beehive springs, separate valley plate, a coil for each plug and lots of other good design features. The stock exhaust manifolds are close to extractors in flow. As per the attached photo, the compactness of the engine can be seen.

One of the more obvious clues is that the ABC is being really nice to Pauline Hanson in the article. They portray as it being Pauline and David Speers against the bank CEO. There's a lot of those types of scams going around quoting various celebrities like actors and celebrity chefs. They probably picked Pauline Hanson because she's been in the news a lot lately with media coverage of recent poll results.

Yes Pete, that is a cold blast lantern. The Chinese lanterns these days are like a lot of their stuff; it looks the part but el-cheapo made. I've got one that's a copy of that Dietz blizzard in the above photo and the metal is paper thin. Even with a big tank, it would be lighter full of fuel than an empty Dietz. A lot of the Hong Kong made lanterns were good in the days before it was all China. I think in those days the manufacturers had some pride in making a decent product.

The article is basically dressed up to look like it was written by the ABC about a supposed episode of The Insiders where David Speers had Pauline and the Comm bank ceo as guests. The storyline goes that Pauline put the bank dude on the spot so he stormed out of the interview, after which the bank complained to the ABC so they didn't air the show. They're making out Pauline let the cat out of the bag about a wonderful, foolproof crypto scheme that was helping ordinary battlers make money and pay the bills. Naturally enough, they have links there so you can send them your money.

As said previously, I'm not a fanatical collector (at least not of lanterns) and have no use for something that won't be used and burnt. Having said that, I saw this Dietz Blizzard No.80 on eBay last night for sale at Hervey Bay and bought it. At $25, it was a steal as they're worth a lot more than that. You'd probably be lucky to pick up a working second-hand one much under $80-$100. The one I have already is my top lantern; they're a great bit of gear. Solid as a brick dunny, always works as advertised and a large lantern to boot with a big tank that gives 80 hours burn time on a moderate setting (hence the No.80 designation). You can burn a lantern like that for a few nights without having to fill it. This one should arrive next week sometime. It's got a bit of surface rust but that's good in my view; I like them to have a bit of character and history. It's also got a slightly bent chimney cap which is easy to panelbeat. It has the thicker, older glass with the logo embossed instead of the etched logo like mine has. I think they stopped embossing the globes in the 1950's, so it's possible this one has been retrofitted. The photo is from eBay.

That's if you can afford the kero, it's over $6 per litre now. Mind you, they burn a long time. The kero these days is a bit funny, it doesn't burn as clean as it used to. Probably some additive. I remember in times gone by, the glass would get a bit of black soot that was easy to wipe off. These days it leaves an orange-brown stain on the inside of the glass that cakes on hard and is very difficult to remove.

Here's a fake website pretending to be the ABC with Pauline. Even without reading the article, the url specialbonds.com should be the first clue. That and the fact none of the usual ABC news site links work. https://specialbonds.com/?utm_campaign=PH-MC00051&utm_source=fb&utm_placement=Facebook_Marketplace&campaign_id=120242149574570603&adset_id=120242149574590603&ad_id=120242149762100603&adset_name=PH-MC00051&ad_name=2&utm_medium=paid&utm_id=120242149574570603&utm_content=120242149762100603&utm_term=120242149574590603&fbclid=IwY2xjawQMxPhleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETJRNmZwTzk5Y1hvRWxiNkJvc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQQMjIyMDM5MTc4ODIwMDg5MgABHgQQF1WioSeP9E70e1aIaOZk3X0aHgW1Mb9DreLZtPqBZ2AqIrpCzHV8vT_Y_aem_B282BLSzZDN_eFdX0LS_ZQ#

This is one of my favourite old lanterns, a Dipti brand made in India. I don't know how old it is but I'd guess 1950's or 1960's. It's a great old lantern, very solid metal and thick embossed glass with the name Dipti Oriental Metal embossed on it. That's the old company name; they're Dipti Metal Industries these days. It also burns perfectly and never gives any problems. It's in the top three in lantern status around here. Fairly rare in this country and not easy to find one.

It was a 1978 vintage. Probably long sold as the listing started 35 weeks ago. Some people forget to take the ad down when they sell.